Roger Hopper of Chesapeake, Virginia and Dawn Neal of Winnipeg are Manitoba Marathon champions.

Hopper, who captured the Newport News One City Marathon in his home state in March, broke the tape in a time of 2:23:46 on Father’s Day in Winnipeg.

“This was great,” said Hopper shortly after he crossed the finish line at IG Field. “We came up from Virginia and it was totally worth the trip. Beautiful course, nice and flat, great weather today so can’t complain.”

Hopper finished eight minutes and 41 seconds ahead of Steffan Reimer of Blumenort who took low Manitoban honors.

“Early on I was running with one of the half guys, he took me for a little ride and that helped,” Hopper said. “You know it’s kind of a long grind by myself late but it was just fun. It was super flat and at that helps and very little wind today so that made things easy.”

Neal captured the Manitoba Marathon’s women’s division in 2:57:58.

“So exciting,” said Neal after her race. “I was not expecting that at all. I went out way faster than planned and just managed to finish. I can’t even believe it.”

Neal finished eight minutes and 55 seconds ahead of Jessica Wylychenko of Winnipeg.

“Ideal conditions to start,” noted Neal. “It was nice and cool compared to last year. Just tried to keep up with the girls going out fast. There were some really fast girls going out and then just tried to hang on as long as I could.”

Nearly 8,000 runners took part in the 45th Manitoba Marathon.

“Today has been a great day,” said executive director Rachel Munday. “We woke up, the weather was looking good. Of course, the fog was a different type of fun. We were hoping it would have lifted a little bit earlier, but it ended up being okay. There was such a great energy at the start line this morning. To have all these runners back with the National Championships and some of our elite runners back, that great energy of everyone else, to be here and have the weather be so great and be on the field – I think people were hungry for it and it’s just been a great day.”

The 44th Manitoba Marathon was held in 2019.

Four long years passed before for the 45th edition of the run was official.

The 2020 & 2021 races were cancelled due to COVID and the 2022 event started but was shutdown because of heat and humidity and concern for the safety of the participants.

Cameron Levins of Black Creek, B.C. (1:01:42) and Elissa Legault of Mascouche, Quebec (1:12:16) won the half marathons.
 

marathonRoger Hopper won the 45th Manitoba Marathon


2023 Manitoba Marathon results